Thursday, November 13, 2014

It happened on an evening when I was making dinner and certain teenage occupants of my home were not doing the things I'd asked of them. Or the things they were supposed to have done without me even asking. Or something along those lines.
And I stood over the stove slaving away making dinner when I had the thought. Hey, no one ever has to ask me to make dinner. Nobody ever reminds me the job needs to be done. I just do it. Every day. I entertained myself for a few minutes with my self-righteous pity party. And then it came to me!
I'd show them. Yes. I would teach these teens a lesson.
I would "forget" to start making dinner. And when someone asked about it, I would tell them, Oh, yeah. I'll do it. But then I would allow myself to get caught up in something else, or just wouldn't stop doing the thing I was already doing. And I still wouldn't make dinner. I would let them ask me again. And again. Until they were really frustrated with me. Then I'd say, This is exactly how I feel every time you don't do the things I ask of you, and the things you're supposed to do because it's your job. Get it?
And in my imagination, a light bulb would go on in their heads. They would understand how I feel. They wouldn't want to put me through that kind of nonsense ever again, and from that day forward they would always do their chores in a timely fashion.
Sounds great. Don't you think?

The only problem is, I keep forgetting to forget to make dinner. *ahem*

6 comments:

That's such a great idea! I think you should do it tonight. My teenagers have that same condition as yours, only Nicolas has a dramatically more severe case than Christian. Christian is *just* 13 so I'm hoping this teenage syndrome doesn't get worse with age.

I am laughing out loud! I have had the exact same idea! :) I haven't done it either, though. And the funny part is... WE THINK that this'll be a great "light bulb experience" for our kids, and everything will be fixed! (As you said, "From that day forward they would always do their chores in a timely fashion!" Problem solved, right?! :) Wouldn't that be lovely?!!!) Sadly, it doesn't usually turn out that way. Oh well. We can dream! :)

I always used to joke about getting one of those "Easy" buttons like they have on the Staples commercials... just to break the tension... :)